inspiRd: Creating Zig-Zag Borders in Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator

Want some Zig with that Zag?

Creating zig-zag borders in Photoshop isn't as hard as you would think! Just invite your friendly neighbor Illustrator to join in on the fun and it's super cinchy.

Extra Tip: Sometimes some good ol' Trololol will help make the zig-zag design process even quicker. ;)

Step 1: Create multiple triangle shapes side by side

Load up Illustrator and, using the Polygon Tool, draw a simple triangle in any color of your choice. Simply click once on the artboard and choose 3 sides or begin drawing your polygon shape and use the down arrow on your keyboard to give it less sides.

Copy your shape by holding down the ALT key and dragging your shape to either the left or right. If you have Smart Guides turned on, it will make it easier to line your shape up without much effort.

Now press and hold CTRL + D until you have as many triangles as you want. CTRL + D will duplicate the last step you made in Illustrator. If you don't want your zig-zag to be as pronounced, you can select all of your triangles and shrink them vertically.

Step 2: Copy your zig-zag and paste into Photoshop as a shape

Select all of the triangles in Illustrator and copy them to your clipboard. Pressing CTRL + C is the easiest and quickest way to copy the shape to your clipboard.

Open Photoshop and paste the zig-zag as a Shape. After your shape is pasted, you can even make it into a custom shape and use it over and over again in the future.*

*Custom shapes will be covered in a future tutorial.

Step 3: Create a rectangle shape below the zig-zag shape & align the shapes

Using the Rectangle Tool, draw a rectangle and make sure it is below your zig-zag shape so that you can see it. Select both the rectangle layer and the zig-zag layer and align the bottom of both shapes to each other.

Step 4: Create the desired zig-zag border using a layer mask

Go ahead and hide your zig-zag layer by click on the eye icon and turning it off.

Select the rectangle shape layer. Click the Add Layer Mask icon. You should now see a white box on your rectangle layer. Make sure it's selected.

While your mask is selected, hold down the CTRL key on your keyboard and click the vector mask thumbnail (the box next to the words Shape 1 on my example). This will create marching ants in the shape of your zig-zag.

Make sure black is your current background color. Once you have confirmed this, press the Delete key on your keyboard. You may now deselect the zig-zag by pressing CTRL + D or going to Select > Deselect in your menu.